The present invention relates to an electronic mail delivery mechanism, particularly for the use via the Internet.
Many businesses currently send out mass mailings to their customers or prospective customers for various business reasons. For example, a public utility such as an electrical power generating company may generate and send out hundreds of thousands of bills to its customers each month. As another example, a company may wish to send targeted marketing information, such as a sales letter to prospective customers on a mailing list. In either example, the company may wish to augment the bill or basic sales letter with additional secondary material generally referred to as xe2x80x9cinsertsxe2x80x9d, which, in many cases, are related to specific information about the particular customer or prospective customer to which it is sent. Various companies produce mail inserting systems, such as the Pitney Bowes Production Mail Center 2000, for purposes of generating mass mailings with such inserts.
Companies that use such mail inserting systems to generate mass mailings typically use older computer systems, sometimes referred to as xe2x80x9clegacyxe2x80x9d computer systems due to the relative age of the computer hardware and software to generate the print data stream. These xe2x80x9clegacyxe2x80x9d computer systems are still found to be effective for purposes of doing mass billings and thus it is desirable to continue to use the output print stream from such computer systems for purposes of generating electronic mass mailings. Applicant""s co-pending U.S. application Ser. No. 08/968,649, now Pat. No. 6,343,327, having Attorney Docket Number E-632 describes such a system and method for electronic and physical mass mailing in which such legacy computer systems are used and in particular, where an electronic data stream can be derived from the mainframe print stream output so as to divert some or all of the print stream information which would otherwise be sent to a physical mail delivery system to an electronic delivery system. It is there seen that an electronic inserter can use the electronic delivery print stream so as to generate a plurality of electronic documents and from there to generate electronic mail pieces which via a message router, can be delivered to the intended recipient. The electronic mail pieces each contain an electronic document and possibly one or more electronic inserts. The electronic router can output such information via e-mail, pager, fax, printer or the like.
U.S. application Ser. No. 08/968,651, now abandoned having Attorney Docket Number E-685 further details a mail delivery system and method in which mass electronic mailing is accomplished by use of a database that includes a plurality of instruction templates, with each template corresponding to one of a plurality of electronic delivery mechanisms. An electronic inserter operates so as to generate electronic insert mail pieces while a computer processor is provided for associating each mail piece with at least one instruction template where each template corresponds to one of a plurality of electronic delivery mechanisms. The electronic mail piece is then delivered by the specified electronic delivery mechanism such as a worldwide web (web) browser, electronic mail (e-mail, pager, fax or printer).
For purposes of determining which of the plurality of mass mailing documents are to be sent via electronic means, U.S. application Ser. No. 08/968,498, now abandoned, having Attorney Docket Number E-653 describes a process for distributing messages from a sender to a recipient according to distribution preferences of the sender and the reception preferences of the recipient so that a sender can compose a message and define a set of preferences that indicate a destination, method of delivery, delivery media, class of service, carrier and other requirements pertaining to the message while the recipient can define preferences that indicate how that recipient prefers to receive messages, as well as the methods that are available for transmission. The sender thereby dispatches the message according to the sender""s preferences and the recipient""s preferences are analyzed to develop a set of routing rules that govern the message delivery process. Conflicts in the routing rules are resolved so that the message can be reformatted if needed, and feedback about the distribution can be provided to the sender so as to assist the sender in ascertaining the quality of service with respect to the delivery of the message to the recipient.
The present invention is directed to an improved system and method for presenting and processing primary documents, especially primary customer documents such as bills, where such primary documents may further be presented with one or more secondary documents (called xe2x80x9cinsertsxe2x80x9d).
The present invention is directed to a digital document delivery system and method, particularly for use on the Internet and particularly for presentation of electronic bills to a customer with a mechanism for payment thereof by the customer. The digital document delivery system comprises subsystems which work together so as to provide a generalized capability to allow an end-user with an Internet browser to view an electronic version of the customer""s bill which would have otherwise been printed, but which is now presented in hypertext markup language (HTML) or similar format. The recipient can then pay the bill that he or she is viewing.
The digital document delivery system comprises four subsystems which typically execute on four separate servers.
A print stream separator in combination with an electronic inserter determines which primary and secondary documents are to be presented electronically to the customer. In order to perform this task, the print stream separator separates an incoming print stream into a physical and electronic delivery print steam, with this separation based upon customer preference data. The electronic inserter then determines what secondary or xe2x80x9cinsertxe2x80x9d documents are to be electronically referenced to the primary document as sent to a customer. These insert documents are generally referenced to the primary documents by hypertext links (sometimes called xe2x80x9chotlinksxe2x80x9d). A router instruction processor (RIP) receives xe2x80x9csend requestsxe2x80x9d messages from the electronic inserter and generates xe2x80x9cbill requestxe2x80x9d therefrom. Each bill request is sent to a bill processing server (BPS). The RIP is responsible for collecting status information regarding the bill to be processed, as well as to make such information available to the submitting process.
The BPS acts as a fulfillment center and is responsible for monitoring the status of an interactive bill presentation server (IBPS) so as to determine when the IBPS has received the print stream data which will be transformed into a viewable electronic document. The BPS is able to respond to IBPS requests for data, including links to other worldwide web sites. The BPS is able to send e-mail messages to bill recipients so as to notify them when their electronic bill is ready for viewing. The BPS is also able to respond to bill payment requests from the end-user and to appropriately control the modification of customer debt, remittance and status data as stored in an account database.
The IBPS is responsible for interactivity with a customer""s web browser. The IBPS takes the print stream data and converts it to a form viewable using a web browser. It also sends status information back to the BPS regarding the status of the bill, including if the customer has requested that the bill be paid while viewing same.
Thus the document delivery system presents an electronic document to a customer by use of incoming traditional print stream data. In addition to a print stream separator and electronic inserter, the document delivery systems includes a router instruction processor, a bill processing server receiving instructions from the router instruction processor, and an interactive bill presentation server for receipt of instructions from the bill processing server and in response to said instructions and receipt of the print stream data, generating an electronic version of the print stream data for presentation in an electronic form, as well as for receipt of response information from the customer concerning a document presented to the recipient, including presenting the response information to the bill processing server.